Podcasting with OneNote

I’ve been podcasting for nearly six years and recorded over 200 episodes. Along the way, I’ve gone through dozens of equipment configurations, including different microphones, PCs, and recording software. But one thing has remained the same since the beginning: OneNote. My fellow hosts and I rely heavily on OneNote, thanks to its sharing and real-time collaboration features.

Every podcast needs show notes to help the hosts stay on track, and this is where OneNote truly shines. All three of the hosts have access to our shared OneNote notebook, allowing us to edit topics, move them around, and even cross them off in real time. The changes are instantaneous, so it feels like we’re sitting in the same room instead of hundreds of miles apart. And with OneNote Online, our guests can access the show notes too, either in edit or read-only form.

Before you can start recording, someone has to actually write the show notes. One of my favorite little-known features in OneNote 2013 is the ability to set a default template for the section. Since each episode of the show follows the same basic format, we created a template for the outline with placeholders for the stuff that changes, such as the episode title, the name of our guest, and of course the announcements and discussion topics. The default template is stored in the notebook, so it’s automatically applied to any page we create in the section, regardless of which client we’re on. This saves us from having to rewrite everything from scratch or delete information from older episodes.

Of course, we use OneNote for more than just the show notes. The podcast notebook contains everything from guest lists, episode schedules, and brainstorming to a full-fledged guide to podcasting with tips, how-tos, and best practices.